Western sanctions against Russia could bring down the International Space Station (ISS), Dmitri Rogozin, head of the Russian space agency Roscosmos, said on Saturday. ANDThe operation of the Russian rockets that supply to the ISS will be disturbed by the sanctions, which will have an impact on the Russian segment of the station, which serves above all to correct the orbit. Therefore, this could cause the “splashdown or landing of the ISS, which weighs 500 tons,” said Rogozin. The space structure measures 100 meters long by 80 wide.
“The Russian segment watches that the station’s orbit is corrected (an average of eleven times per year), also to avoid space debris“, explained Rogozin, who often shows his support for the Russian army on social networks.
Posting a map of the world, the head of Roscosmos said if the ISS fell, Russia was protected. “But the populations of other countries, especially those led by the ‘dogs of war’ (Western countries) should think about the price of sanctions against Roscosmos,” he wrote, calling those who have imposed these punitive measures “crazy”.
station in orbit
On March 1, NASA indicated that it was working to find solutions to keep the station in orbit without help from Russia. Crews and supplies are transported in this segment by Soyuz rockets and the Progress ships for transporting food and merchandise, both Russian. Rogozin explained that the launcher necessary for these rockets to reach their point is affected “by US sanctions from 2021 and by sanctions from the European Union (EU) and Canada from 2022.”
Roscosmos claims that it appealed to its American (NASA), Canadian (ASC) and European (ESA) partners.”demanding an end to illegal sanctions against our companies.” Space is one of the last fields of cooperation between Russia and the United States.
In early March, Roscosmos announced its intention to prioritize the construction of military satellites, due to Russia’s growing isolation from the conflict. Rogozin also announced that Russia would no longer supply the United States. engines for its Atlas and Antares rockets. “Send them into space on their broomsticks,” she commented.
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On March 30, astronaut Mark Vande Hei and the two cosmonauts Anton Shkaplerov and Pïotr Dubrov will return to Earth from the ISS on a Soyuz rocket.
The International Space Station is a multinational collaboration project between the agencies of the USA (NASA), Russia (Roscosmos), Japan (JAKA), Europe (ESA) and Canada (CSA). It serves as a space research laboratory that orbits the earth some 400 kilometers away.